Remember children, look before you cross...

The street is a dangerous place for those on foot. Especially foor feet, black fur, and didn't look both ways. Enough with the intro though I want to get this down in a fresh state rather than trying to remember it some other time.

I was walking along a street in Laramie just trying to focus, or let other focuses go when a black dog came up behind me. I didn't think of it much as it ran by me and I looked back for an owner. I didn't see anyone but they might have been ahead of me. I was going to the park that happened to be on the other side of the street. Now a sort of clarification, the road curved a little bit so I was crossing from the corner of one block, the inside of the curve to the sidewalk on the other side. I was crossing and got about three quarters of the way across when I thought about what the dog might do, this of course being about the time I heard a car. The dog started crossing as the car came about the curve. At first I thought the dog had enough clearance but that wasn't the case, the headlights lit up the dog's side and a horendous crunch ensued. The dog cried and moved toward the sidewalk I was standing on. He was favoring a leg the way he was limping but I couldn't see very clearly. As he came up onto the sidewalk I grabbed his collar and he pushed his head against my leg and stopped whining.

I was really happy to see tht the driver of the caar had stopped and came back to see what happened. That action right there, just coming back to take responsibility, I can do that and I know many other people can too, though I have seen a lot of people just keep going. A guy that had been riding his bike came over too to see what was happening, the people who owned the house we were in front of came out as well offering to call the police and the vet so that this could be taken care of correctly. I was really glad that these people came out or back to help rather than just turning a blind eye. O fcourse the first thing they asked me as they all appraoched was if it was my dog. No, of course not, but there were no tags except for the s-hook that is supposed to hold a tag.

The lady from the house brought out one of her dog's many blankets to help cover the dog. Once covered by the blanket the dog wanted to lie down and so I made sure that the leg he was favoring didn't twist wierdly as he lay down. A little whining and he was lying down with a blanket to keep shock from settling in. I just squatted there petting the dog and talking to him to get a response every so often sort of like how they train you to deal with human shock victims, except he was much quieter once he settled into a position. Now we waited for the police to come because there were no animal patrol people out and about during the night.

Before the blanket was put over him the three of us, the bicyclist, the driver, and I assessed the damage to be a dislocated left hip because he couldn't quite pull it up if it had been an injury lower down the leg. He wasn't bleeding as far as we could see however later on we found out that he had a little bit of an abrasion on the ribcage. Now interestingly he had been hit on the right side, the side of the abrasion, but the dislocated hip was on his left side. This doesn't really make sense until you think that the dislocation probably came about because the far leg, or the left leg probably went underneath the body and was pulled from the socket. The right leg had just been reconfirmed by the collision and it stayed intact, however if the car had been higher clearance or a truck the dog probably would have been dead.

The police came, a young officer that pulled up and got out. Rather than just turning around after seeing that it was just a dog he said that he would help get it into the truck that the guy whose house this was in front of provided. Unfortunately for the kid that had hit the dog the police officer gave him the usual accident information please... license, what he saw, how to get a hold of him. Probably all very unecessary but still good procedure. The officer did a check that I know but forgot about, shining a light into the dog's eyes to see if they react to the light, they did, a good sign that the dog wasn't in shock.

The officer and I had gloves on and so we lifted near the head while the bicyclist got the rear-end. We got him into the truck. The bicyclist and I rode in the back of the truck out to the vet's. We had a conversation out there, when we got there we unloaded the dog and the vet got him up on a table. The dog, anyone could tell was in pain, but stood on the table patiently as the vet took a look at him. The dog it seems will be fine and if no one claims him it seems that the bicyclist may keep an eye on him if not adopt him.

I got a ride back and now know a few more of the Laramie residents, really nice people here, a lot willing to help a dog. And what a dog: after getting hit, settling down right away, not biting those trying to help him even under so much pain. Even though it was not a nice experience it was a good one. Although it doesn't have to happen again, remember: look both ways, all of you.

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